“Every year I feel that I am a better chef. That’s the beautiful thing about this profession.”

Santiago Lastra’s contemporary Mexican restaurant KOL, which opened between lockdowns at the height of the pandemic in 2020, turns five this month. To celebrate the milestone, he’s throwing a party where he’ll be joined by guest chefs Ana Roš, Rodolfo Guzmán, Thomas Frebel and Nicolai Nørregaard who will each contribute their own creative take on the taco.

By Hilary Armstrong

Congratulations on five years of KOL. I remember my first meal there in October 2020, face mask on, hand sanitiser on every table. From that challenging beginning, how have the first five years been?

“It’s been a rollercoaster. We are a restaurant that opened in that moment when everything in the world changed so we became very adaptable. A lot of things have happened this side of COVID in London but then KOL is a restaurant that just doesn’t stop. It’s a restaurant that is constantly evolving. It’s a creative restaurant so we didn’t really have a formula; it was more of the idea, then everything else has been evolving and changing. Every year we have a better team and every year I also feel that I am a better chef. That is the beautiful thing about this profession, that it’s a craft. A carpenter could be 70 years old and making their best work. Being a chef is like that.”

How has KOL evolved? What do you feel you have achieved?

“When we opened the restaurant, it was a five-course tasting menu and we were doing a lot more covers. Over the years, we’ve been trying to refine everything, do more courses but also less covers, and to elevate the experience. We also changed the bar downstairs; we closed it so now we use the whole space as one experience so the guests can go downstairs to have desserts. I also opened another restaurant, Fonda, which turned one last week. We have a Michelin star at KOL and we got quite a lot of recognition, so we’re very proud of everything we’ve been building in the last years. At the end of the day, having a restaurant open for five years and being able to do what you love is the biggest award.”

Do you think the London restaurant scene has changed since you opened?

“People have become more and more aware of sustainability and using local ingredients. More and more restaurants have the concept of using local ingredients with inspiration from wherever the chef is from. I see this happening more since we opened which is pretty cool. I guess also the whole world is looking to London as a source of inspiration for restaurants and concepts and styles. Some people say that some of the best Indian food in the world you can eat in London and now that is the case with Thai food and Mexican food as well. I think we’re becoming more and more a global food destination.”

You’re holding a taco party to celebrate your fifth anniversary and have assembled a super group of chefs. What’s the plan for the event?

“I invited some of the best chefs in the world, people that I admire the most in the industry to get inspired by Mexico, by Mexican concepts and Mexican flavours. Whenever you bring someone to Mexico, they get blown away by the flavours and the way that we put together ingredients. All these chefs have been in Mexico before and they love Mexican food. Rodolfo Guzmán is coming from Chile; Ana Roš is coming from Slovenia; Thomas Frebel and Nicolai Nørregaard are coming from Copenhagen. Instead of just doing a four hands dinner and asking them to do whatever they do every day in the restaurant, I asked them to create a special dish, very simple – it’s street food – using Mexican flavours but with their own take on it. When you ask someone really good to do something really simple, they come back with something that is out of this world.”

KOL’s fifth anniversary taco party takes place on Sunday 26 October 2025 at KOL, 9 Seymour Street, Marylebone, London W1. Tickets, £110 (including one drink and five dishes).

kolrestaurant.com